Ottawa is sending more than $1.2 million to a B.C. group with ties to Vancouver Island to study the potential opening of a new, state-of-the-art wood processing facility. The money is going to Iskum Investments LP, which describes itself as a “consortium of coastal First Nations-owned businesses,” including some on Vancouver Island. The funding will be used to help complete a detailed commercial, technical and financial analysis of a potential site for the facility. Iskum says it’s already conducting a comparative analysis of three locations along the B.C. coast, and the money will help inform future investment decisions. Once completed, the proposed facility would support more than 700 full-time jobs – ranging from operations to harvesting to logistics – and would be primarily Indigenous owned, according to the federal government. Iksum says the wood processing facility would help the coastal economy and forestry industry, which is “struggling to secure a reliable, economic supply of fibre.”